Co-transfection with Livin and Survivin shRNA Expression Vectors and Biological Behavior of HepG2 Cells

Liver cancer is one of the most common digestive malignancies. Conventional therapies such as surgical resection and chemotherapy are ineffective, and it is rare to achieve complete remission or cure. Application of RNA interference (RNAi) to reduce oncogene expression and thereby change the biology of tumor cells is one of the most important methods in tumor therapy (Sibley et al., 2010). Livin and Survivin are members of the Inhibitor of Apoptosis (IAP) family of proteins, and are highly expressed in hepatocellular carcinoma cells. These two genes exert their anti-apoptotic effects through the IAP repeat domains (baculovirus-IAP repeat, BIR). Knockdown of either Livin (Liu et al., 2010) or survin (Hung et al., 2012) can manifest therapeutic effects against liver cancer. It has also been shown that these two genes, together with XIAP, exert a synergistic effect that serves to inhibit cellular proliferation and to promote cell apoptosis in human bladder cancer cells (Yang et al., 2010) and human colon cancer cells (Oh, 2011; Carrasco et al., 2011). However, it remains unknown as to whether